Filed at 5:23 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Al-Qaida leaders in hiding and foot-soldiers preparing for terrorist attacks are turning to outlawed Pakistani extremist groups for spiritual and military training, shelter and logistical support, say U.S. officials who see them as an emerging threat.
One group -- Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, or Army of the Pure -- is an example of how Osama bin Laden's followers take advantage of scattered Islamic militant allies to maintain momentum, four years after a U.S.-led military campaign destroyed al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan.
Lashkar is among the organizations fighting for the disputed region of Kashmir. U.S. officials say the group stands out for a number of reasons, including its missionary work and other involvement outside the area.
Elements of Pakistan's intelligence services have supported Lashkar in the past. Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, banned Lashkar in 2002 for its alleged links to an attack on India's parliament.
Lashkar leaders insist the group's focus is freeing Muslims in Indian-controlled Kashmir -- not attacks on the West. Pakistani officials say the group is local, not international.
Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S., Jehangir Karamat, said in an Associated Press interview that he considers Lashkar incapable of international terrorism and particularly of working with al-Qaida because the groups have different languages and agendas.
Al-Qaida has ''no linkage with any organization in Pakistan,'' Karamat said. ''They don't need it and they don't have it -- never had it.''
Still, the United States is closely watching Lashkar because of its apparent willingness to help those involved in the global jihad on a grass-roots level.
The U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the subject's sensitivity, said they do not believe Lashkar's leadership is coordinating international attacks with groups including the remnants of al-Qaida. Instead, they worry about connections among foot-soldiers -- extremists who may point friends of friends to paramilitary camps.
Last year, the State Department estimated the group had several thousand members.
The Lashkar organization represents a classic example of the diffusion of Islamic extremism -- based in Afghanistan until the U.S. toppled the Taliban in 2001 -- that CIA Director Porter Goss and other intelligence officials have warned of.
Ken Katzman, a Middle East expert at the Congressional Research Service, said groups including Lashkar have revived the training structure once found in Afghanistan, setting up ''Afghanistan East'' in northern Pakistan. Some in Pakistan deny the camps' existence.
''I think this is emerging as the next theater to test whether Pakistan is serious about eliminating the al-Qaida presence,'' Katzman said.
Some examples of high-profile moments where Lashkar's fingerprints are suspected or spotted:
--International authorities are looking into whether an Islamic school run by Lashkar trained at least one of the bombers who attacked four London buses on July 7. Officials are also looking closely at the associations of the three other bombers. Pakistani authorities have yet to find direct links and say any tie may be a small piece of the investigation.
--In Virginia, a prominent Islamic scholar was sentenced to life in prison this summer for encouraging his followers to join the Taliban and fight the United States after Sept. 11, 2001. After one fiery speech, several attendees went to Pakistan and received military training from Lashkar. The young men were part of the ''Virginia jihad network'' that sometimes trained for holy war by playing paintball games in the woods.
--U.S. officials say Abu Farraj al-Libbi, a top al-Qaida operational leader picked up in Pakistan in May, ran from a site associated with Lashkar before Pakistani forces captured him in a graveyard shootout. He is in U.S. custody, accused of planning two assassination attempts on Musharraf. Some Pakistani officials have said al-Libbi was sheltered by another Muslim militant organization.
--In March 2002, a senior al-Qaida lieutenant and planner, Abu Zubaydah, was captured at a Lashkar safehouse in Faisalabad, Pakistan.
-- The Australian Taliban, David Hicks, whom U.S. forces captured fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan, was trained by Lashkar in the late 1990s. He is being held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The Bush administration is cautious about pushing too hard on Pakistan, an ally in the fight against terrorism.
The United States added Lashkar to its list of terrorist groups in 2001 and extended the designation in December 2003.
''We hope this list will help to isolate these terrorist organizations ... and to prevent their members' movement across international borders,'' State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said then.
U.S. officials acknowledge the differences between al-Qaida and Lashkar, including their respective roots in the Wahhabi and Deobandi sects of Islam. Yet they say that their histories have intersected since the 1990s, creating highly complex and dangerous relationships that authorities sometimes struggle to monitor.
The officials and counterterrorism experts note that camps affiliated with Lashkar may be particularly attractive to extremist recruits because they don't get the scrutiny of those run by al-Qaida, now largely underground.
''What's crazy is that these groups, because they are a little bit more low key than al-Qaida, they have been able to operate, in Pakistan especially without hindrance,'' said Evan Kohlmann, an international terrorism consultant who has studied Lashkar.
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Associated Press writers Foster Klug in Washington and Matthew Pennington in Islamabad contributed to this report.
The Associated Press
